Everything Nate Oats said after Alabama's 100-75 win over Texas A&M

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The Alabama men’s basketball team defeated Texas A&M, 100-75, on Saturday at Coleman Coliseum. After the Crimson Tide won its 15th straight SEC home game, coach Nate Oats spoke to reporters. Below is everything he said after moving to 18-7.

Oats’ opening statement…

“That’s a big win. We’ve got teams right on our team in the SEC race. We’ve got to protect home floor, so we need to get it. We didn’t do a great job on the defensive glass. They were the No. 1 offensive rebounding team in the country. What did they end up with, 52 percent of their misses. Not great by us, but I did tell the team – I gave them three things. One, we’ve got to turn them over so they don’t get shots up. We were OK. We turned them over 14 times, probably not quite enough. Two, we’ve got to actually box out and rebound. We weren’t great on that.

“And then three, I said, they don’t get any points for getting an offensive rebound. You only get points if you put the ball in the hole. So after they get an offensive rebound, we’ve still got to get a stop. We’re not going to pitch a shutout. They dang near played three centers at sometimes, just go all-in on the offensive glass. (Andersson) Garcia is probably the best rebounder in the country. He had eight offensive rebounds and only scored three points. So I thought we did a decent job after they got some O boards of actually making sure they didn’t score off those. The 21 second-chance points is a lot, but considering how they scored, we were able to manage it. We had 16 second-chance points ourselves. 

“We obviously shoot the ball a little better. We start four guards, and they played three centers multiple minutes throughout the game. They usually have at least two center-types or they call them power forwards or whatever they want, but their main objective is to go up and get offensive rebounds. Two totally different styles, but we were fortunate we got them at home and shot the ball pretty well and got the win because it was a well-needed win at this point in the year.”

Oats on bringing in Nick Saban to talk to the team…

“He is, to me, maybe the best team coach of any team sport in modern college sports history, and he’s right here. I talked to him shortly after he retired, he told me when he was going to come back to town and I asked him if he wouldn’t mind speaking to the team when he came back to town. So this was in the window. We kind of had a week off between games, and I thought it’d be good for our guys to hear from a respected coach like him on what took to win.

“He was great. He churned out NFL players. He’s great. He said, ‘I don’t know much about basketball, but here’s what I can apply from football.’ I thought he was really good. He’s obviously won a ton of games. I’ve tried to learn as much as I can from him. I was fortunate that I was able to spend five football seasons with him here and learned a little bit. Shoot, if he’s around here, I’m going to keep picking his brain and see if he will keep talking to our team as the years go on.”

Oats on Alabama’s defense coming off the bye…

“They’re a hard one because you could be really good at a lot of things on defense and still not be great because you gove up so many O boards. So we were definitely improved, not to the level I’d like to see us. Our analytics had us at a 1.04 and they had 75 pounds on 72 possessions. So not where we needed to be, but we were able to beat pretty good team by 25. 

“I thought (Mark) Sears was better. I think his effort – he won the blue-collar and won the Hard Hat. I thought his effort was a lot better. We said there’s lots of things that we still need to get better at. We’re gonna keep working at it. I think it was good that we played A&M before Florida because Florida is another good offensive-rebounding team, and so we’re gonna have to be really good on the glass. We were better, nowhere close to where I’d like to see us, but trending in the right direction.”

Oats on Latrell Wrightsell Jr. not passing up open shots…

“Anytime he’s open, he needs to shoot the ball. He’s one of the best shooters I’ve ever coached. Why he would ever pass up an open shot is beyond me. I wish my college coach told me to shoot every time I was open. Like I get irritated with him when he passes up open shots. And if he had got his foot behind the line on the one transition three, he’d have 17 points. Yes, anytime he’s open at any point in the game – I mean, barring some end-of-game situation where it wouldn’t make sense – but if he’s open from three, he should be shooting the ball 100 percent of the time.”

Oats on Sam Walters’ aggressive approach on offense…

“We definitely wanted him to be aggressive. He led us in rebounds. I’ve been on him to be a little tougher. He’s another one that he should never pass up an open (shot). And he doesn’t usually. I don’t have that problem with Sam passing up open shots. But he shouldn’t pass up open shots. He’s one of the best shooters. We recruit shooters for a reason.

“Shoot, it was great that they were honoring (Antoine) Pettway’s team here because Pettway recruited Sam. So he was here to watch him in person, which was kind of cool. But we want shooters and we want them to shoot. I thought Sam had some aggression. He had the and-1 finish. And for him to lead us in rebounds and really led us in defensive rebounds with five and the next closest guy had three, it was pretty impressive.”

Oats on Herb Jones, Noah Clowney coming back during the All-Star break…

“That was awesome. Herb’s been back during the All-Star break. Clowney, they’re both such good kids. And Brandon (Miller) has been around a lot, too. A lot of these guys want to come back and be a part of it. Noah Gurley was in the building for the game today. So I asked Clowney to talk to some of our guys, and he did. I saw him at halftime, he was back there, and I said, ‘Whatever speech you gave wasn’t working because they’re not rebounding it like you did. So maybe you can swing at it again, go in there at halftime and try to get them to rebound a little better.’

“But nah, it’s great to have guys like that to kind of talk to your guys. They’re trying to get to the level that they’re at. I love those guys, and I love them coming back around. We welcome them with open arms whenever they want to come back around.”

Oats on Alabama being undefeated when Wrightsell scores in double figures…

“I didn’t realize that. So when Latrell scores in double digits, we’re 8-0? So I should probably draw up more plays for him then to make sure he gets to double digits. Typically, he gets stuff in the flow. Most of our guys get their stuff in the flow. Look, when he’s playing well, the ball is moving. That’s actually a good barometer, to be honest with you, because he’s not a guy we run a ton of plays for. When the ball moves, he ends up getting open shots. When he scores double digits, because the ball is typically moving, we’re playing great on offense and we probably get wins. 

“And to be honest with you, it’s easier to play in the flow and get the ball moving on offense when you’re running off your stops on D. So when we’re getting defensive stops, pushing and attacking the defense before it gets set and the ball is popping like it was today – we had 20 assists – he’s gonna get left open enough times to end up in double digits. So it’s probably a good barometer of how good our defense is to get in transition and how much the ball is moving on offense.”

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